The Tale of Emberwolf
Author: Kittycat79Miststorm, Daughter of Hawkfrost 11:50, January 29, 2013 (UTC) Introduction Shortly after the events of The Last Hope, when the Clans are still rebuilding from the shock of the StarClan - Dark Forest battle, a litter of kits is born, and one of them may have a destiny to do something far braver, riskier and more dangerous than any other cat has done before... Allegiances ShadowClan LEADER: Blackstar - old, dull-pelted white tom with jet-black paws and a muzzle turning gray with age DEPUTY: Rowanclaw - muscular, dark ginger tom with yellow eyes MEDICINE CAT: Littlecloud - elderly, blind, patchy-furred undersized brown tabby tom with nearly all claws ripped out and stiff joints Apprentice, Violetpaw WARRIORS: (toms, and she-cats without kits) Applefur - mottled brown she-cat with green eyes Apprentice, Snakepaw Scorchfur - dark gray tom with a torn ear Ratscar - brown tom with a long scar across his back Snowbird - old, smelly white she-cat with green eyes Apprentice, Wheatpaw Pinenose - black she-cat with green eyes Apprentice, Vinepaw Dawnpelt - cream she-cat with orange eyes Apprentice, Honeypaw Tigerheart - dark brown tabby tom with amber eyes Ferretclaw - cream-and-gray tom Toadfoot - dark brown tom Blizzardstripe - gray tabby tom with cream ventral areas, a darker face and blue eyes Redwillow - mottled brown-and-ginger tom Starlingwing - ginger tom Smokefoot - black tom with a ragged pelt APPRENTICES: (more than six moons old, in training to become warriors) Honeypaw - light ginger tabby she-cat with amber eyes Vinepaw - light brown tabby tom with blue eyes Wheatpaw - yellow-cream tom with shaggy fur Violetpaw - dark gray, light gray and white tabby she-cat QUEENS: (she-cats expecting or nursing kits) Shrewfoot - gray she-cat with black paws; mother to Ferretclaw's kits Fawnkit (gray-brown she-cat) and Featherkit (tortoiseshell-and-white she-cat with black paws and black-tipped ears) Olivenose - tortoiseshell she-cat; mother of Blizzardstripe's kits Emberkit (cream-and-ginger tabby she-cat) and Rockkit (mottled blue-gray tom) Tawnypelt - tortoiseshell she-cat with green eyes; mother of Ratscar's kits Mousekit (black-and-white she-cat), Hazelkit (brown tabby tom) and Twigkit (ginger-and-white tom) and Rowanclaw's kits Tigerheart, Dawnpelt and Flametail ELDERS: (former warriors and queens, now retired) Oakfur - snaggly-toothed, scarred, stiff, small brown tom Owlclaw - old brown tabby tom with fading sense of hearing, smell and sight Kinkfur - tabby she-cat with ripped fur that sticks out at all angles and one disabled leg mauled by a fox Ivytail - elderly black, white, and tortoiseshell she-cat with a skinny, weak frame Cedarheart - blind, deaf, wrinkled and frail gray tom with a silvered muzzle, tangled whiskers and a patchy pelt; the oldest cat in ShadowClan Story Chapter 1 "Mummy, Rockkit bit me!" A squeaky voice rang through the bramble nursery, topping even the sounds of cats walking around, chattering and patching up the den outside. A calico she-cat with thick, soft, silky fur leapt from her nest and ran to where a pair of small kits - one dark blue mottled and one cream-and-red tabby - were standing. The tabby kit had her pelt bushed up in aggression, while her attacker shrank back and put on his I'm-about-to-whine-and-thus-avoid-trouble face on. The queen growled to the gray kitten, "What do you have to say for yourself, Rockkit?" Rockkit glanced at the other kit, then back at the adult cat. "But mum, Emberkit attacked me first! She really hurt me!" he whined. Predictable. "Nonsense!" the she-cat meowed. "Where are your scratches, because I can see Emberkit's as clear as RiverClan's river on a sunny day. Now apologize to your sister and we can all go and share a rat. Applefur, Dawnpelt and Tigerheart just returned from a hunting trip - they should have something." "Fresh-kill! Yay!" Rockkit yelped. He swiftly glanced at his littermate again, muttered "sorry," then cheerfully bounced after his mother. The tabby she-kit bounded past her brother and squeezed through the nursery entrance, tumbling into the sandy clearing. She quickly jumped to her paws and shook the sand from her thick coat. Emberkit and her brother, Rockkit, were both five moons old, which meant they were only one moon away from being apprentices! The kitten shivered with excitement. A deep voice snapped her out of her thoughts, and she turned her fluffy head to see a big warrior with a tufty, ragged pelt black as night walking towards them. "Well well well, how's ShadowClan's newest queen goin', eh, Olivenose?" he asked Emberkit's mother. "For the millionth time, Smokefoot, I'm not ShadowClan's newest queen anymore. Featherspots is," Olivenose growled with play-annoyance. "Oh really? Who's over at the fresh-kill pile after a hard day's work of a border patrol and skirmish with pesky ThunderClan kittens?" a gray-flecked silver she-cat joked from over at the heap of prey in the fresh-kill stump, overhearing her Clanmates' conversation. Smokefoot looked at Olivenose with a "told-you-so" expression on his battle-scarred face. "Well, technically she is, since Redpaw, Birdpaw, Petalpaw and Dillpaw only recently left the nursery..." Olivenose meowed, but Smokefoot stopped his daughter by giving her an affectionate cuff around the ear. "Just messin' with ya, Olive," he meowed, then turned to his grandkits. "What's up, Emberkit, Rockkit?" he asked. Rockkit was about to say something but ShadowClan's leader, Blackstar, a giant white tom with black feet, called the senior warrior away. "Better luck next time!" Emberkit joked, jumping onto her brother. "Ultimate Clan leader timing fail!" "No it WASN'T!" the blue-gray tomkit growled, pummeling his littermate's belly until she leapt off. "C'mon, kits. This fresh-kill ain't gonna stay warm forever, and either you eat fresh-kill or go without supper tonight." "But what about milk?" Emberkit whined. "Nope," Olivenose stated. "You two have already drained enough energy from me. I don't know how Featherspots dealt with four ''kits. You'd need StarClan's blessing to survive that!" ---- Emberkit fluffed out her striped fur and snuggled closer to her mother's soft white belly. It was now dark, and the camp was pitch black and silent. She and Rockkit had eaten their food and then retreated to the nursery for the night along with Olivenose, curled up against her. Rockkit was snoring like a badger, fast asleep - both kits were tired out from "training" with Featherspots' daughter Dillpaw earlier. The gray-and-tortoiseshell she-cat was a tough trainer, that was for sure. Unable to rest for some reason, Emberkit fidgeted amongst the soft pine needles, leaves, moss and downy bird feathers and squirrel fur that made up her family's nest until a small shape emerged from the warm shadows. "Emberkit?" it hissed. "Yeah?" the red-and-cream she-kit replied, and a black-and-white kitten padded towards her, yellow eyes lit up. "Hiya!" she squeaked. "Wanna go on an adventure?" "Where, Mousekit?" Emberkit asked. "Oh, just around the camp," Mousekit answered quietly. "Okay," Emberkit squeaked in an accidentally high pitch, but luckily, none of the queens stirred. "Let's go!" Emberkit meowed, and sniffed and felt her way through the darkness to the nursery entrance, fur brushing against Mousekit's, then squeezed through the entrance and tumbled into the clearing outside like she did every morning. Her denmate followed. "Wow, it's hard to see out here," Mousekit's mew was muffled by the screech of an owl. Emberkit looked up at the sky, black as Blackstar's paws and strewn with tiny, glittering silver stars. The white shape of the moon shone amongst them. She looked around and glimpsed her friend's green eyes shining in the gloom. "Maybe we should go back to our Mummys," Emberkit suggested. "It's sort of scary out here." "Yeah," Mousekit agreed, and the two kits turned but as they did, a twig cracked outside the camp. Voices murmured faintly in the distance, and paws pounded the earth. "Monsters!" Emberkit yowled. "Run!" The pair rushed back inside their den. It was no lighter inside, but still much warmer and smelt of milk and sleepy cats. "Mumma!" Emberkit screeched again, dashing up to Olivenose and poking her belly with a forepaw. "Cats are coming!" The queen's mint-green eyes blinked open, and she looked at her daughter. "Hot's wong?" she yawned. "Me and Mousekit went outside and we heard pawsteps and cats and stuff and it's scary out there!" the kitten fretted. "Cats? But it's so early in the night! The dawn patrol wouldn't have left yet, and the dusk patrol returned as we were going to bed!" Olivenose realized. A tortoiseshell she-cat named Tawnypelt, who was Mousekit's mother along with Twigkit's and Hazelkit's, raised her head, stretched and ran over. "It could be a surprise attack! We must warn Blackstar!" she growled and charged out of the nursery, leaving her son and daughters with Olivenose. Olivenose faced her kit. "What did you see? What did you smell?" she asked Emberkit rapidly. "Er...er," the kit struggled for words, but suddenly a memory hit her head: when she was outside, she'd bent down to sniff a mossy tree root, but another scent had filled her nostrils as well. She tried to recall it... Chapter 2 "WINDCLAN AND THUNDERCLAN ARE ATTACKING!" A terrified screech rang out in the clearing, and the first word jolted Emberkit back into reality. It was WindClan she had smelled! A dry and earthy stench was what she scented outside! "Hurry, Olivenose! You must evacuate!" Toadfoot, an uninjured brown tom, had appeared at the nursery entrance. "But I must fight for my Clan!" the calico queen argued, then sped past the warrior and ripped out of the bramble wall, claws unsheathed and teeth bared. "W-what!? Mummy, wait!" Rockkit yowled and scrambled through the bedding over to Toadfoot, but the adult cat halted the mottled gray kit with a clean paw. "Your mother's a fighter," he hissed. "Let her battle. Tawnypelt, Snowbird and I will help you escape. Quickly!" he urged, shoving Rockkit along, whilst Hazelkit toddled over and climbed onto Toadfoot's muscular shoulder. The other queen arrived shortly and grabbed Emberkit in her jaws, the fur on her tortoiseshell back sticking up and caked with blood and dust, ripped by fresh wounds. "Nooooooo!!!!" Emberkit yelled from the bottom of her tiny lungs. "I want my mummy!" "Well you can't have her right now," Tawnypelt growled. "So shut up and let us get you outta here!" The white-pelted Snowbird squeezed through the den entry hole, blue eyes wild with panic, her chest and throat seriously ripped and bleeding, her breathing laboured. Like Tawnypelt, she had already fought. "All the kits here?" she screeched. "Yep," Toadfoot reported. Then he noticed the she-cat's injuries. "Snowbird, you're very unstable and bleeding. You'd better visit Littlecloud." "No, I'm fine," she puffed, spitting up blood. "I'm not even sure Littlecloud's medicine cat...I'll grab Mousekit and the others..." She was obviously wounded and dizzy, but once Snowbird made up her mind, she wouldn't let go of it. Toadfoot herded Mousekit and her brother Twigkit over to Snowbird, who picked them up in her jaws, and they ran out of the nursery into the fray of battling cats. --- Emberkit blinked open her eyes. She was lying on the grass outside of camp, a gentle breeze rippling her soft fur. ''Where am I...? Then, suddenly, it all came flying back to her. The battle, the terror of her mother leaving, the crudeness of Tawnypelt, Snowbird's horrible wounds... As she remembered all that had happened, Emberkit realized that the cool breeze was humid and uncomfortable, soured by blood and fear. Specks of the crimson liquid coated the grass under her, and she could still hear cries in the distance. Getting up, the tabby kit glanced around at her new surroundings. Instead of the warm, milky-scented, shady nursery with feather, fur, moss, leaves, and soft pine needles beneath her, she found dark, coarse grass pricking her pelt, and pine trees towered over her. Emberkit scraped her paw pads on sharp, un-downy needles scattered over the earth, which was soft and peaty, stinking of swamp water. It looked like cat's dirt thrown in a stream then spread over the ground the way it glistened with moisture and sucked her little paws down into it every step she took. Soon her sleek cream-and-ginger striped coat was splattered with smelly mud. Even smellier than Snowbird or one of the elders! The kitten sniffed the air. Though scenting was still difficult due to her young age, she picked up the strong scents of some other familiar cats. Luckily, the stenches of WindClan and ThunderClan were distant and faint. "T-Tawnypelt? Snowbird? Toadfoot..?" she whimpered. A dark shape towered over Emberkit, green eyes glowing. "Emberkit! Are you injured?" she asked. More to come Category:Fanfiction